Today’s recipe is a delicious fusion of spicy Mexican flavors with Italian pasta. A perfect weeknight meal. You could easily make this ahead of time and just pop it in the oven when you get home from a busy day. It’s also a great recipe for feeding a crowd.
My family would be happy to eat pasta several nights a week, but I get bored with the same old thing. So when I stumbled upon this Mexican/Italian fusion recipe at The Way to His Heart I knew my family would love it. Maeghan adapted the recipe from A Pinch of This & That. Instead of using a taco seasoning packet, I substituted similar spices and used ground chicken sausage instead of ground beef. Enjoy!
Ingredients
- 1 lb. ground chicken sausage
- 2 teaspoons chili powder
- 1/2 teaspoon cumin
- 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon onion powder
- dash cayenne powder
- 1 cup water
- 4 oz. cream cheese (I used reduced fat)
- 14-16 jumbo pasta shells
- 1.5 cup salsa
- 1 cup enchilada sauce
- 1 cup cheddar cheese
- 1 cup monterey jack cheese
- 3 green onions
- Sour cream
Directions
- Preheat oven to 350°.
- In a frying pan cook ground sausage. Stir in spices and water and cook uncovered for about 20 minutes until the water cooks off. Add cream cheese, cover and simmer until cheese is melted. Blend well. Set aside to cool.
- Cook the pasta shells according to directions; drain. Set shells out individually on cutting board/baking sheet so that they don’t stick together.
- Pour salsa on bottom of 9×13 baking dish. Stuff each shell with the meat mixture. Place shells in 9×13 pan open side up. Cover shells with enchilada sauce. Cover with foil and bake for 30 minutes.
- After 30 minutes, sprinkle shredded cheese on top and bake uncovered 10-15 minutes. Serve with green onions, black olives, sour cream and/or more salsa.
More Stuffed Shell recipes I’d like to try:
Butternut Squash Stuffed Shells, How Sweet It Is
Stuffed Shells with Turkey and Artichokes, Pink Apron Baker
Pesto Chicken Stuffed Shells, Cooking with Cristine
Buffalo Chicken Stuffed Shells, Sugarcrafter
Sausage & Spinach Stuffed Shells, Cooking on the Side
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I love to bake, especially cookies, cakes, and pies. I’ll post my adventures in the kitchen, my favorite new recipes, as well as our family favorites.
I’m so glad you enjoyed it. Your picture looks good!
These look like they would make for the perfect weeknight meal Barbara!
This sounds so yummy! I like all these flavors.
Looks delicious!
I pinned it at
http://pinterest.com/pin/628569960/
Can’t wait to try!
Barbara, this looks like my type of meal. Can’t wait to try it
Scrumptious! exactly the kind of comforting dish I crave…
Cheers,
Rosa
LOVE this recipe. Super family friendly for sure!
Delicious and so easy … perfect week night meal
I love the chicken sausage idea. Pretty sure this would be a lick-the-plate dinner at my house. We will be making this soon!
Holy guacamole! This looks fabulous! Mexican is our absolute favorite, so I’m always looking for ways to change it up. I’ll be adding this recipe to our list–thanks for sharing.
This is a great recipe…looks so good. We could eat Mexican food every night, so this is perfect for a change!
My mom makes a similar recipe and I have been thinking I need to make it. It’s honestly one of my favorite recipes and the flavor is out of this world good. She puts the French’s fried onions on top. This looks like a great recipe, Barbara and I love the fixins that are on top. Like that you use the chicken sausage to save a few calories:-)
love the sound of these! thanks so much for sharing my shells.
That’s a fun way to change it up, maybe even crunch a few chips on top.
What a fantastic idea! The family will go gaga for this one.
ButterYum
I made something similar to this once, except they were called taco shells and had bits of crumbled tortilla chips over them (we didn’t care for those crumbled bits). This recipe looks a lot better than the one I tried and I really like how you leaned them up with the chicken sausage and the reduced fat cream cheese. All in all, I’d say it’s a fairly healthy dish and it looks so delicious! I’m pinning these
Looks delicious mum! And also a great fusion between what you and your very lucky family would like
xxx
Good one! I like the idea of salsa rather than an Italian style sauce. The salad looks great too!
Combining Italian and Mexican together? They’re my two favourite cuisines! Yum!
This really is a great idea! A fun way to change up the same ol’ pasta!
great mix of two of our fav foods, perfect for make ahead meals. thanks for sharing!
une assiette bien parfumée
Je te souhaite un bon mardi, ici les gelées matinales sont arrivées
Valérie.
Southwest pasta shells?! Now your talking my language:)
This is my idea of good pasta!
Those stuffed shells look absolutely marvellous, what a fun dinner!
*kisses* HH
p.s. do stop by and enter my giveaway daaahling, there are two opportunities to win!
These flavors would be perfect now after a Thanksgiving weekend. Thanks for the inspiration Barbara!
Nice meal to make after Thanksgiving! I will bookmark this recipe for the Superbowl weekend ! Thanks for sharing!
Clever combination! kinda like an enchilada, but much more original. GREG
After weeks of Fall flavors, plus Thanksgiving dinner, bright, spicy Mexican is just what the doctored ordered, and in fact we had Mexican last night. I only wish THIS dish was on the menu! I crave pasta, and love all the goodies stuffed into those shells! I’m definitely making these soon!
BTW…the orange pate de fruits didn’t work in the cranberry cookies, they melted out and burnt so it’s off to buy orange jelly slices! I should have just followed your recipe and bought them in the first place
This look lipsmacking and perfect for everyday!
I absolutely love this idea—thank you for sharing!
Great way to change it up from the Thankgiving meals. Nice post!
Fantastic recipe! Usually when I think of noodles, I think of Italian meals. Mexican is usually my meal of choice, so I can’t wait to try this recipe soon!
Thanks for sharing!
Cheers,
Christi
Sounds delicious! My family would love this.
oh yum! this is right up my alley, i love this recipe!
Happy Wednesday!
Barbara! What a great combination of flavors! I love mexican and I love pasta so why not combine the two? the spices in this are irresistible- gonna have to make this SOON!
These look good, but I’m heading over to the butternut squash recipe…
I am obsessed with winter squash right now!
Barbara, what a great way to stuff a shell. I love the idea of Mexican. I can’t tell you how happy, I am, you shared a savory recipe on Bake with Bizzy.
This will be a nice change from turkey dinner and all the leftovers that followed. And I bet it freezes well too. I hope you and your family had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday.
Wonderful idea!! Love the melding of Italian and Mexican! And anything with pasta is always great
This is the perfect weeknight meal & my whole family would love it